Maybe we should vote no? Reason #4

Reason #4 to vote no on Overtures 23 and 37:  When Tim Keller and Kevin DeYoung presented the Study Committee Report, it was said, that it would be unbiblical and against our Confessional Standards to discipline someone for using the language of “gay Christian.”

Tim Keller and Kevin DeYoung presented their overview of the report at General Assembly. They are different voices in our denomination. In their presentation they said it would be unbiblical and against our confessional standards to discipline someone for using the language of “gay Christian.” Here is the quote from their presentation: 

All 7 members of the committee agreed. That first part of the statement 10 is pretty strong. It’s really saying, pastorally we really strongly advise against calling yourself a Gay Christian. But the “Nevertheless” is trying to get across the fact that you’re going beyond the Confession, and probably the Bible to take an English word and then say, “We’re going to discipline you over that, [over] that use of that [word].” We’re trying to say that people use these words differently. Their intentions are different. And therefore, what we really ought to do is we ought to use our pastoral tools to try to work with people rather than to simply say, “On the basis of the Confession, on the basis of the Bible, we can tell you you’re sinning by using that word.” We said, “No, we can’t go that far.” Some people will want to do that, and this is one of the things that will probably be debated. But I really think that statement 9 and 10 hit that balance pretty well because it’s really pretty unmistakable:  as a denomination, if you adopt this, we’re saying, “No. Pastorally, we’re really advising against that.”

It’s vital to understand the rationale of users of this term. We cannot discipline them without violating the Confession and the Bible itself, according to the authors of the study report itself.

Therefore, we should reject the BCO changes recommended by Overtures 23 and 37 because they violate the intention of the authors of the Study Committee Report. 

Here are my posts that go further into the reasons to vote no on the PCA Overtures:
A Vision
Reason #1
Reason #2
Reason #3
Reason #4
Reason #5
Reason #6
Reason #7